Page 42 of Switching Skates

“Those morning rides are some of my favorite memories from high school.”

She’s surprised by my honesty and sarcastically responds, “Oh, yeah, I bet. Listening to Maeve and me belt out music at seven thirty in the morning must have brought you nothing but happiness.”

“You’d be amazed how much happiness the things you do brings me.” I avoid her gaze as I pull out of the parking lot, feeling her stare on me the entire time.

“I think we should stop by your house so I can get more of your clothes. Since we’re not changing back right this second, it seems.” She exhales heavily.

“Yeah. Also …” I pause, wondering exactly how to word this next sentence. “We should probably talk about how to handle the whole shower situation.”

“Oh God.” Her head whips my way, and I fight back a laugh. “Can we just not?”

My laugh deepens as I head to my house. “I don’t know about your body, but mine doesn’t like going more than a day without at least a body shower. So, we might want to do that soon.”

“We?” She inhales. “And how do you propose that?”

I bite down on my bottom lip to try to control the giggles wanting to break free. “Well … I do have an idea, but I don’t know how you’re going to feel about it.”

“Continue.”

I turn onto my street. “We wash each other while we close our eyes.”

The wheels are spinning in her mind as she studies me. “I-I don’t hate that idea. It might work. But we’d definitely need to wait for Maeve to be out of the house because her catching us showering together wouldn’t be good.”

Hearing the wordsshowering togethercome from her makes my nonexistent dick twitch. I wish it were a bit more romantic of an experience than it’s going to be. Maybe one day.

“Does she have plans with Jackson soon? I could text her,” I offer.

Daphne grabs her phone and rapidly types. “Done. We also need a cover story as to why I’m still staying at the house tonight since she said I could only stay one night.”

“We could tell her that I saw some creep lurking around and that you should stay just for security and safety.”

“Aren’t you just full of ideas today?” She smiles, and I think that’s because she likes my plan. “Yeah, that’ll work, I think.”

“Perfect.” I pull into the driveway of the team house and kill the engine. “Nobody’s here.”

She exhales loudly, relieved. “Thank goodness. Come on.” She shoves the bags between us to free her from her shopping-bag prison and opens her door. She gets out and shuts the door behind her.

I join her, fumbling with my keys, finding the house key, and I unlock the front door for us when I reach it.

The house is quiet, thankfully. I lead the way upstairs toward my room, Daphne right behind me.

My stomach drops when we round the corner and run straight into Ross—whose car was definitelynotparked out front.

My lips part to say something, but I freeze when Ross eyes me with a gleam in his gaze.

“Mason.” He huffs out an amused breath, shaking his head side to side as he addresses Daphne. “Chet’s going to owe me twenty bucks!”

“You had a bet going?” I ask thoughtlessly.

He turns to me, his eyes widening. “Oh God, not some creepy one about you, Daphne; don’t worry. It was about how long Mason was going to be able to stay away from you once you arrived.”

“Really?” Daphne asks him, surprised.

Surely, I can understand the shock at hearing his confession, but I can’t imagine that she doesn’t know how I feel about her. I’ve done little to hide it.

Ross turns back to Daphne. “Mase, Chet is going to be so proud of you.”

“No,” she blurts out. “You can’t tell anyone about this, dude.” She looks at me for help.